Texaco gas station on L.B. Scott Road.
PHILIPSBURG–A gas station employee was handed a nine-month prison sentence Wednesday for having staged an armed robbery at the Texaco gas station on L.B. Scot Road, on August 7, 2017.
The administrative worker had claimed that he had been raided by two armed and masked men, but in reality, he had conspired with two other persons to take away the gas station’s proceeds from its weekend sales.
The Judge followed the Prosecutor’s demand and sentenced Randall Sabacion Atlan (38), who hails from Jamaica, in absentia to nine months. The Court also imposed a dispossession claim to the tune of NAf. 13,330, being one-third of the criminal profit in this case.
The defendant had said in a statement of August 7, 2017, that he had been approached by two “guys” who had masks on. They were both armed with handguns and were dressed completely in black. He said he had opened the door and they had pushed him inside.
“At this time, I already had all of the money that was in the safe on the table ready to be counted. I do not know the amount that was stolen. One of the guys put the money in a small garbage bag that he took out of his pants pocket and [he – Ed.] left. I did not see in what direction they ran into. … According to my manager, there was approximately NAf. 40,000 in the safe at the time of the robbery,” he said in his statement.
Apparently the defendant had not taken into consideration the video-surveillance cameras of several businesses in the gas station’s vicinity which had brought the scam to light.
Based on a compilation of these camera images, a totally different scenario emerged. The images reveal that the suspect left the gas station’s back office in the company of another person, who left the premises while walking slowly.
After the man left, the defendant could be seen walking quietly towards the front of the gas station. He then returns to the back office and sounds the alarm three minutes after the would-be robber had left the premises.
According to the Court, the images only leave room for one conclusion: that the defendant had failed to tell the truth and had provided an “apparently false” statement.
“There can only be one reason for this, and that is that the suspect has wanted to cover up the fact that he and others have stolen the weekend yield from the gas station,” the Judge stated in the verdict.
To make the loot as big as possible, the suspect had ignored his employer’s orders to call Pan American money transporters to pick up the proceeds from the Friday and Saturday sales and drop these off at the bank.
“In doing so the suspect has shown that he is unworthy of the confidence his employer had put in him, and on top of that he caused financial damage and nuisance,” the Judge said.
The damage claim filed by the general manager of Blue Mountain Management B.V., the company that reportedly operates the gas station, was rejected because the manager could not prove with documents that his company was the actual station operator, and that he could legally act on behalf of the B.V.
Source: The Daily Herald https://www.thedailyherald.sx/islands/90806-gas-station-employee-jailed-for-nine-months-for-staging-robbery
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